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Gender

Testosterone Rex is a firm riposte to the recent book Testosterone: Sex, Power and the Will to Win, which places testosterone as so important that “a simple fact remains: without testosterone there would be no humans to have a history”. This bold claim is challenged by neuroscientist and feminist writer Cordelia Fine, who wrote the bestselling Delusions of Gender.

Sally Campbell’s article on the Gender Recognition Act (September SR) raised important issues, but I don’t think accepting self-identification is the answer. Gender reform must seek women’s consent, not their deference.

It can take up to five years to go through the process of applying for a Gender Recognition Certificate. This is monstrously long for people wishing to transition and leaves them abandoned in a legal limbo and more vulnerable to misogynist violence.

There is a surge of interest in the politics of gender and sexuality among a new generation of activists. Sympathetic characters that challenge gender stereotypes are emerging in popular culture. The passing of equal marriage legislation signifies a more progressive approach towards homo- and bi-sexuality, yet many LGBT+ teenagers continue to fear being outed at school. Pride parades here and in the US pull huge crowds, but are dominated by commercial outfits.

Freud’s methods may not have been very scientific, but his insights into the social construction of gender and sexual identity were remarkably radical for a middle class man in conservative Vienna a century ago. Socialists can take those radical insights far further, writes Mark O’Brien.

Freud presents an intriguing paradox for Marxists. His explicit theory of the psyche was clearly not revolutionary. He believed that the psychological repression of desire was the necessary price for the achievements of “civilisation”.

He was also deeply pessimistic about the possibility of human transformation.